Ep 3.28: Fear Itself: Al Smith, Anti‑Catholic Fury, and the Road to Crisis

In this episode, Monsignor and Teresa step into the political firestorm of 1928, when Catholic candidate Al Smith faced a tidal wave of anti‑Catholic prejudice, cultural suspicion, and the full force of the Ku Klux Klan. Monsignor traces Smith’s rise from Brooklyn’s streets to the New York governor’s mansion, his doomed presidential bid against the wildly popular Herbert Hoover, and the deep anxieties that shaped the nation on the eve of the Great Depression. As Hoover’s engineering mindset meets the fragile economic realities of the late 1920s—overproduction, collapsing farm prices, and dangerous international debt—listeners watch the stage being set for the crash of 1929. It’s a gripping look at fear, faith, and the forces that reshaped America.